Oscars 2024: Robert Downey Jr. Wins Best Supporting Actor For Oppenheimer

Marvel Cinematic Universe star Robert Downey Jr. is officially an Academy Award winner! The actor known best for playing Iron Man/Tony Stark just took home the prize for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal of Lewis Strauss in Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer. Downey Jr. has been the frontrunner this season, taking home a BAFTA, SAG Award, Golden Globe, and more. The actor won the Oscar tonight over Robert De Niro (Killers of the Flower Moon), Ryan Gosling (Barbie), Mark Ruffalo (Poor Things), and Sterling K. Brown (American Fiction).  

Downey Jr.’s Oppenheimer win marks the actor’s first Academy Award. He was previously nominated for Best Actor for Chaplin (1992) and Best Supporting Actor for Tropic Thunder (2008). While appearing on The View last month, the star explained why he’s glad he didn’t win the award back in 1993.

“I was young and crazy,” Downey Jr. said, explaining that winning an Oscar at 28 years old “would have put me under the impression that I was on the right track.” 

Not only was Downey Jr. the frontrunner, but his fellow nominees weren’t shy about expecting to lose to him. 

“I’mma tell you, Robert Downey Jr.’s gonna win, and he’s incredibly deserving. He’s an incredible actor. Like, you should give him love,” Brown said on The Graham Norton Show (via Variety). “The fact that I get a chance to be nominated along with him and Mr. [Robert] De Niro and Ryan Gosling and [Mark] Ruffalo… I’m just happy to be in the room.” 

Gosling also joked about losing the award in a promo for the Oscars. “That’s not gonna happen,” he replied when host Jimmy Kimmel talked about the perks of winning. 

Will Robert Downey Jr. Play Iron Man Again?

Now that Downey Jr. is an Oscar winner, is it less likely we’ll see him again in the MCU? The actor first played Tony Stark/Iron Man in Iron Man (2008) and continued to star in multiple Marvel films until character’s his death in Avengers: Endgame (2019). 

There’s been a lot of speculation about whether or not the MCU will revive Downey Jr.’s character with rumors swirling that the original six Avengers will once again return to the franchise. Previously, Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige said Downey Jr. was “part of the family,” but when it comes to his return, “we’ll have to see.” However, the producer sang a different tune in a recent Vanity Fair profile on the actor. 

“We are going to keep that moment and not touch that moment again,” Feige shared. “We all worked very hard for many years to get to that, and we would never want to magically undo it in any way.”

“We’d already said tearful goodbyes on the last day of shooting. Everybody had moved on emotionally,” Avengers: Endgame co-director Joe Russo added. “We promised him it would be the last time we made him do it- ever.”

While it’s not surprising to hear there are no plans to resurrect Tony Stark, that doesn’t necessarily mean fans won’t be seeing Downey Jr. in the MCU again. There are plenty of rumors and theories about Avengers: Secret Wars, including the idea that an alternate version of Tony Stark from another universe could appear in the film.

Congrats to Robert Downey Jr. on his first Academy Award!